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Books That Inspire 2001

One of the first “grown-up” books that I remember reading was Rachel Carson’s Silent Spring, written in 1962. I had always been interested in human impacts on the environment, and I loved how Carson wrote passionately, yet with clear and simple language, about the many ways pesticides disrupt the natural world. Silent Spring paints a convincing picture of the disasters that can slowly, unintentionally unfold when humans try to tinker with individual strands of the web of life. Her imagery continues to shape my personal philosophy and academic life.